The LA Times has a new interview out with Michael Gambon.
The actor says the enormity of the “Potter” phenomenon hit him again recently at the London premiere of “Half-Blood Prince,” where more than 4,000 kids turned up to get a glimpse of the magical cast. Gambon called it both heartwarming and bittersweet. “I was really moved by the number of children there. It was raining and everyone was drenched, some of them had been there for hours. You feel responsible for them in a way. All their books and pieces of paper for autographs were all wet, the pens wouldn’t work. It was so sad. It makes you realize how big this thing is.”The filming of the final Harry Potter movies, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” is underway but Gamon’s contributions aren’t schedule until February. He says that makes it feel as if the end is still far away for him, but he has already begun to reflect on the experience.
According to The AP, the Vatican has given Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Two Thumbs Up!
The Vatican newspaperL’Osservatore Romano even gave two thumbs up to the film’s treatment of adolescent love, saying it achieved the “correct balance” and made the stars more credible to the general audience. The newspaper said the film, which opens Wednesday, was the best adaptation yet of the J.K. Rowling series about the adventures of the bespectacled child wizard Harry Potter and his Hogwarts chums as they battle Harry’s nemesis, the evil sorcerer Voldemort.
While criticizing Rowling for omitting any explicit “reference to the transcendent” in her books, L’Osservatore said the latest installment nevertheless makes clear that good should overcome evil “and that sometimes this requires costs and sacrifice.”
CS: And these are all new sets and locations? Because the first six movies have all been at the same Hogwarts sets just redecorated and dressed differently. Yates: Yeah, yeah, and this time we’re out on the road and then we come back to Hogwarts, but the difference is we trash it. We blow it up. It turns into Stalingrad, which will be really haunting.
CS: Are you actually going to blow up Leavesden Studios when you’re done there? Yates: (laughs) I’m not sure they’d be too pleased with us if we did that, but we’ll probably end up blowing up half of Leavesden. I keep saying to the special FX guys (that) these things are going to be big. We have to go out with a bang.
